A Night In Rogues' Haven
by Lady Emily
Summary: Just once, she'd like to go into the cellar and just find rats... A night at a scenic New England inn turns into a nightmare for Nancy and Frank.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Don't worry, folks, I'm still working on _With A Vengeance_. This is just a little two shot I wrote up in the middle of the night last night. If you read it in the dark maybe you'll find it as eerie as I do...

Disclaimer: Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys are not my characters and I am making no money from the writing of this story.

* * *

"And... we're in." Triumphantly, Frank Hardy held up the padlock that had barred entry to the wine cellar of the Rogues' Haven Inn. The heavy wooden door creaked as he eased it open.

Behind him, Nancy Drew held her breath, waiting to see if the noise had woken anyone; it was well past midnight, after all. When no one came to investigate, they slipped through onto the darkened cellar stairs, closing the door behind them and leaving themselves in pitch blackness.

"Start looking for clues." Frank whispered, joking.

There was a clicking sound, and a beam of light sliced through the darkness, illuminating Nancy's face. "All right." she grinned impishly. She handed her flashlight to Frank, who was on the stair below her. "You used to be a boy scout... I thought you'd be a little more prepared." she teased. As Frank descended into the dark cellar, she kept one hand on his elbow, letting him lead the way.

Frank shone the flashlight along the wall, where antique kerosene lanterns hung every couple of feet. "I did come prepared." he said. "I brought these." She couldn't see what he was holding up in the dark, but a few seconds later the flame of a match flickered into being. Quickly, he lit the bottom two lanterns, illuminating the majority of the cellar with a dim yellow light.

"Candlelight." Nancy remarked, accepting her flashlight back. "Kinda old-fashioned, but I like your style."

"What can I say? I'm a romantic." Frank shrugged.

Nancy ducked her head, hoping her blush wasn't visible in the darkness. There was just something special about Frank Hardy... something that could make her knees weak at the most inopportune moments, like when they were covertly searching a creepy wine cellar for clues about a woman's disappearance. Even though investigating was her job, and serious business, working with Frank somehow made her feel like they had come to this remote New England inn for a vacation.

When Faye Lawrence, an old acquaintance of Nancy's, had called her over the weekend, distraught over her missing sister Chrissie, Nancy had immediately thought to call on Frank and his brother, Joe, to assist her with the case. They had traced Chrissie to the Rogues' Haven Inn, the last place she had been seen. Rogues' Haven was a quaint mountain getaway, miles from the nearest town. The inn itself was very old, built in classic New England style, all red brick and gray slate. Besides Nancy and the Hardys, there were only two other guests: an elderly couple celebrating their fiftieth anniversary.

The proprietors of the establishment, a middle-aged couple named Branson, were quiet but pleasant. They had told the detectives that Chrissie Lawrence had come alone, stayed for a week, and checked out five days ago. At first, Nancy had been unsure whether her disappearance was truly a case. According to Faye, Chrissie was a real nature enthusiast, and Rogues' Haven was an outdoorsman's paradise—secluded from civilization, with miles and miles of trails for hiking and snowshoeing, areas for hunting, and a small lake for boating and fishing. Although she could never have suggested it to Faye, Nancy had wondered if Chrissie might not have simply wandered into the woods and gotten lost or injured. She and the Hardys had explored the nearby trails to no avail, however, and the local sheriff and his deputies had swept the surrounding area with cadaver dogs with the same result.

The case had taken a morbid turn when the local sheriff had happened to mention a handful of other disappearances in the area over the past few years. Though only one man was actually reported missing, four other men and women had disappeared under mysterious circumstances, the last one just weeks before Chrissie. They were later ruled death by accidents—one presumed lost in a boating mishap, one a wild animal attack, and so on—but no bodies were ever recovered.

And if that hadn't been enough to convince her that something sinister was happening here, Joe had disappeared yesterday.

Frank was trying to stay calm about it—over the years Joe had proven himself just as talented at getting himself out of scrapes as into them—but Nancy could practically feel the undercurrent of anxiety radiating off of him. She wanted to say something to reassure him, but she knew that there was nothing she could say. The only thing that would truly ease his mind would be finding his brother safe and well.

The two detectives spread apart as they ventured farther into the basement, looking for clues. The wine cellar had featured on the brief tour Gary and Marlene Branson had given them of the inn, but they'd spent very little time inside. Nancy had grown suspicious when she'd noticed how fastidious they were about locking and relocking the padlock on the door. Sure, it was possible that they were just protecting their valuable collection of wines, but she couldn't shake the feeling that they might be trying to hide something besides a few impressive bottles of sherry.

"I guess it was too much to hope that we'd find Joe tied to a chair down here." Frank said, crouching down to look under a rack of wine.

"We'll find him, Frank." Nancy promised sympathetically. "That is, if he doesn't find us first."

"Yeah." Frank said, meeting her eyes and nodding. "You're right. I know you're right." He ducked his head to walk under the stairs and hissed as he hit his knee on a stack of bricks that was concealed by the darkness. "Guess they're planning on doing some home repairs." he commented, looking at the pair of mason's trowels and bucket of quick-dry mortar sitting beside them.

Nancy was shining her flashlight on one of the far walls. "Could be." she murmured, but she was lost in thought. There was something strange about this particular area of wall and it took her a minute to put her finger on it. The mortar—the cement between the bricks—was a slightly brighter white in this area than around the bricks next to it. About a foot off the ground, she spotted a thin black piece of metal sticking out of the mortar. Kneeling down, she grabbed hold of it and pulled. After a bit of wiggling there was a snap and the piece of metal slid out of the wall. Nancy looked at it under the flashlight, puzzled. It looked like one of the earpieces from a pair of glasses.

"Frank? Do Gary or Marlene wear glasses?"

Frank thought for a moment. "I haven't seen either of them wear glasses, no. Why?"

"No reason." Suddenly Nancy felt cold all over. She didn't know why she'd had this awful thought, but once it had crossed her mind, it wouldn't leave. She tried to shine her light into the hole the earpiece had come out of, but it was too dark. Scooting back a few times, she reached for one of the trowels lying under the staircase. She placed the tip of it against the hole and tapped the end of it.

The mortar cracked easily. Much too easily. As if the builder had only put mortar on the front half-inch of the brick.

Or as if, after the wall was built, someone had been scraping away the fresh mortar _from the inside_.

Nancy's hands shook as she gave the mortar another tap, this time on the other side of the brick. This time, when it cracked, she felt the brick come loose. Her shaking hands used the trowel to pry the brick all the way out of the wall.

On some level, she must have known what she would find, because she dropped the trowel and flashlight with a clatter and instead used her hands to stifle the scream that bubbled up in her throat. Still, a strangled cry escaped her.

She was staring at part of a human face. A dark eyebrow, one closed eye, a nose that was already partially decomposed. An awful stench wafted out of the hole, and Nancy's stomach churned. One hand still clasped over her mouth, she quickly picked up the brick and shoved it back in its place.

A second later Frank was by her side. "What is it? Nan?" he whispered frantically.

She let him help her to her feet and then pressed her face into his chest. "There's... oh, god, Frank. There's a body in the wall."

She felt him tense against her. Pulling back, she looked up and saw all the color drain out of his face. "Is... Is it-It's not-?" he stammered.

Nancy's eyes widened in realization. "No! Oh, no, it's not Joe." She clasped both his hands in her own, not sure whether she was taking comfort or doing the comforting. "It's not Joe." she repeated. "I think... I think it was the girl. The one who disappeared right before Chrissie. Who they said died in a boating accident."

Frank didn't seem the slightest bit comforted; in fact, his expression was looking sicker by the moment. Nancy watched his eyes pan along the walls for a minute before she realized why.

All along the length of the cellar, every six or eight feet, was another patch of bricks held together with bright mortar.

She counted them. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.

Five. But that wasn't right. There were seven missing people, including Chrissie and Joe.

Joe! This was like a nightmare. Could Joe be trapped in one of these walls, just feet from them, slowly starving or suffocating to death?

_Dead already?_

Frank was evidently pondering the same disturbing thought, because he picked up the trowel Nancy had dropped and stared, wild-eyed, between the bright patches, as if trying to decide where to dig first.

Nancy tried to calm her queasy stomach by taking a few deep breaths. Everything inside her was screaming at her to _getoutgetoutgetout_ of this pit of horrors, but if Frank was going to tear this place apart looking for Joe—and he _was_, she had no doubt of that—there was nothing to do except help him do it. She turned around to get the other trowel... and found herself staring straight into the enraged eyes of Gary Branson. She yelped in surprise. "Mr. Branson!"

"Just what do you think you're doing?" Gary drawled. How had Nancy ever thought he seemed pleasant? Those eyes, that grin... he was clearly deranged.

"Frank and I were just-" Nancy groped frantically for Frank's hand, trying to sell a cover story that no one would believe. She batted her eyelashes and lowered her eyes to the ground, as though she were embarrassed. "We just wanted to be alone."

Gary cracked up. "Just wanted to be alone!" he cackled. "Sure, no problem!"

Frank dropped Nancy's hand and lunged at Branson, grabbing him by the collar of his shirt. "Where's my brother?" he gritted out. "Is he still alive? _Tell me!_"

"Aw, he's still alive." Branson drawled. One hand came out of his pocket and pressed a gun to Frank's ribs. "But you won't be if you don't get back." he finished in a hard tone.

Muscles ticking in his jaw, Frank let go of Gary's shirt and stepped back next to Nancy.

"So I guess you seen what we got in the walls." Gary said in an oddly conversational tone. It sent a chill down Nancy's spine.

"Does your wife know what you do down here?" she spat accusingly.

"Ayuh. Think she does." Gary grinned. He called up the stairs. "Isn't that right, honey?"

"Isn't what right?" Marlene asked, coming down the stairs herself. "And stop shouting, you'll wake Mr. and Mrs. Winters." She looked from Frank and Nancy to her husband and back. "Well _shit_."

"Eh, Mr. and Mrs. Winters'll sleep through anything. They turn off their hearin' aids 'fore bed." Gary said.

"And what're you doin' with these two?" Marlene asked, waving a hand at Frank and Nancy. "What about the kid in the barn?"

Gary shrugged. "He can be the boat accident _survivor_, for all I care. But these two gotta go. They seen too much. They been diggin' in the walls."

"Why did you kill all those people?" Nancy asked. She was ignored.

"All right." Marlene sighed. She went back up the stairs and came back momentarily with some rope and a roll of duct tape. She tossed the rope to Nancy. "Sweetie, tie up your boyfriend. Wrists and ankles, come on now."

"Why?" Nancy asked.

"'Cause the man with the gun says to." Gary said, waving the gun.

Eyes wide, Nancy looked at Frank, hesitating. They both knew that once he was immobilized, their odds of escaping dropped dramatically, especially when, against Gary, Marlene, and a gun, they were outnumbered at it was.

"I could shoot him right here if you'd rather." Gary offered. "It might wake the Winters, but I'll bet I could convince them it was nothing more than the wind slamming the barn door." He flexed his finger on the trigger.

"Don't!" Nancy cried. She turned to Frank. "Give me your hands."

Frank's jaw clenched again but he nodded at her, moving his hands together behind his back. Nancy knotted the rope quickly around them, tying them tightly enough to stay on, but leaving him just a bit of wiggle room. He'd gotten out of worse, she was sure.

At least, she hoped.

"Now his ankles." Gary said. He frowned at Frank and gestured with the gun. "Help the lady out, son. Sit down."

Gingerly, Frank sat down on the floor, moving his ankles together so Nancy could tie them. Her hands faltered slightly as she looped the second piece of rope around his legs; no matter why she was doing it, every move she made was damning them further. Worse, it felt like a betrayal.

"Hey..." Frank whispered. Her eyes snapped to his, and he raised his eyebrows, just a little, in encouragement. She nodded and pulled the knot tight. He needed her to be strong, and she could do that, for him.

"Isn't that sweet?" Gary laughed. "One more thing. A piece of tape over his mouth, if you please, Miz Drew."

Nancy scowled at him, but ripped a piece of duct tape off the roll and smoothed it over Frank's lips. "Fine, alright. It's done."

"Not quite." Gary said. He looked back at his wife. "How's it coming with that mortar, darlin'?"

Nancy's heart froze in her chest as she looked behind Gary to Marlene. While she had been tying Frank's bonds, Marlene had left the cellar to fetch a bucket of water, which she was now adding meticulously to the powdered quick-dry mortar that had been sitting under the stairs. She spun around, following the modified cellar wall all the way to the end, where there was a niche in the corner, about three feet by five, set into the wall like a doorless closet. "No." she gasped, looking to Frank.

He didn't seem surprised, and she wondered if he'd reached the conclusion faster than she had.

"Well what did you think we were gonna do?" Gary asked. His next words were directed at Frank. "You should appreciate this, at least. We were saving that space for the girl you came looking for, and then, when your brother found her, snoopin' around the trap door in the barn, we figured he could take her place." he grinned. "Now _you _can take _his._"

"No, please, no." Nancy pleaded.

Gary ignored her. "We're runnin' outta wall space." he lamented, shaking his head. "Anyway, son, I'm gonna need you to scoot on back there into the wall."

Frank stared at Gary with hard eyes, not moving.

"I'll ask you one more time." Gary said, and Nancy felt an arm wrap around her throat and a gun pressed to her temple. "Scoot on in there."

She watched with horror as Frank did.

"Mortar's ready." Marlene said.

Gary tightened his hold on Nancy's neck and walked them both forward, and for a second Nancy had a vision of herself being forced to brick up the wall with Frank inside. "No." she ground out against the choking force on her windpipe.

"Don't you ever shut up?" Gary growled, grinding the gun against her head. "That stuff dries fast. We only got fifteen minutes."

"Frank..." Nancy gasped out. He didn't move, just looked her in the eye, and she could tell that now, he was trying to stay calm for _her._

"Don't forget to worry about _yourself_." Gary said. "Because neither of you is going anywhere."

"Ever again." Marlene added.

The pressure on Nancy's throat increased, and spots started to swim before her eyes. Frank began shouting, his cries muffled by the tape. His face was the last thing she saw before her vision went black and she passed out.

* * *

A/N: The Bransons' wine collection initially consisted of aged burgundies, but I felt that I should change it to sherry to really complete the homage to one of my favorite short stories by a classic American author. Five points and the next chapter to anyone who can guess what _variety _of sherry is in those bottles!

And, for heaven's sake, don't forget to tell me what you thought of the story! Conclusion coming soon!


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: I told you I wouldn't leave you hanging for long! Thank you to all my readers, and especially my reviewers: anette95, SnowPrincess88, Really Cinderella, Nan35272738383, supernaturalsam, guests 1, 2, and 3, Caranath, and BM originally.

Amontillado _was _the variety of sherry I was looking for, taken, of course, from Edgar Allen Poe's delightfully creepy short story "The Cask of Amontillado." Congratulations to SnowPrincess88, supernaturalsam, guests 1 and 2, and Caranath for guessing correctly! I'm glad to see I have so many fellow American lit aficionados among my readers... This chapter is for you guys.

* * *

The first thing Nancy was conscious of was an ache in her neck. She was lying flat on a cold floor, her head bent up to rest against the wall. The next thing she realized was that her hands were tied behind her back, pinned to the floor under her body. She tried to open her eyes and found that they were already open. She was lying in pitch blackness.

Suddenly she remembered what had happened. The cellar, the bricks, Branson... It only took the warm, unmoving form pressed against her side to push her over the threshold of her silent terror. "Mmmph!" Her scream came out as a moan—her mouth was taped shut. She took in a shuddering gasp of air through her nose, hot tears of panic already welling in her eyes.

"Nan, hey, I'm here." Frank's voice came out of the darkness to her left, and her veins flooded with relief. The body was Frank, and he was alive, and they could get out of this. "You're awake, thank god." He sounded just as thankful as she felt.

Of course he did, Nancy realized. It didn't take a genius to figure out where they were or what had happened. And while she'd been unconscious she'd missed the worst part: helplessly watching the Bransons close the hole in the wall brick by brick, entombing them alive. And having to watch while she lay crumpled against him, not even knowing whether she was all right, must have been absolute torture.

"I can't quite get these ropes untied." Frank grunted, clearly straining against his bonds. "Are you okay?"

The question was ludicrous in light of the situation, but Nancy kept herself together. "Mm-hmm." she said, trying to convey an affirmative with just her voice.

"Your tape." Frank said. "I just got mine off. Hang on, maybe we can get yours off too." He squirmed around a little, trying to move so that he was level with her. "I still can't see a thing." he murmured. "Can you?"

"Mm-mh." Nancy muttered. Negative. She could feel Frank's breath on her temple, and she could sense him, but she couldn't see him. His nose brushed against her cheek, and she was suddenly very aware of how loudly and quickly her heart was pounding. Was it adrenaline? Fear? Something else?

"Hang on." Frank whispered again. "I think I can... uh, I'm going to try to... um..."

"Mm-hmm." Nancy said again, giving him permission. She could feel her cheeks heating up, and she wondered if Frank could feel it too. It was completely ridiculous to be so hyperconscious of his proximity to her. They were most likely going to die here; talk about an inopportune moment to be spellbound by Frank Hardy!

Still, she couldn't help her sharp little intake of breath when she felt his mouth nuzzling her jawbone, his bottom teeth lightly grazing her cheek in order to catch the edge of the tape. He did, clamping it between his teeth and pulling his head back, peeling the tape away from her skin inch by agonizing inch until it was finally gone. "Frank..." she murmured, her voice hoarse.

A moment later, his lips were back on hers, and this time there was no tape between them. The kiss was hot, probing, filled with quiet desperation. When they pulled apart they were both panting heavily. "What are we doing?" Nancy asked breathlessly.

Frank huffed a laugh, resting his forehead against hers. "I'm so glad you're okay." he confessed.

"You too." Nancy was reveling in his closeness, because she knew that once she began to focus on their situation, she would have a hard time staying calm.

"We've got to get out of here. I know." He sounded slightly guilty, as though he'd just been reprimanded for not focusing on the business at hand. He dropped another quick kiss on her lips, and she tilted her head up to catch it. "I know."

Nancy nodded. Her feelings for Frank were a can of worms she almost never allowed herself to open, but businesslike... Businesslike she could do. "Okay. If we can turn around, back to back, I might be able to untie you." They wriggled around until they could reach each others' knots, and Nancy winced at the pins-and-needles sensation as the blood began to flow back into her fingers. Flexing them experimentally, she found that she was able to grasp Frank's rope. "How long was I out?"

"Forever." Frank said. "At least that's what it felt like. Must have been thirty, thirty five minutes, at least. It's hard to tell."

"So all the cement will have hardened." Nancy said quietly.

Frank stayed quiet for a long minute. "Yeah. Yeah, I think so." More silence as Nancy continued to work on his knots. "I'm pretty sure the wall's not airtight. I don't think we'll suffocate."

"So, what? We die of thirst?" Nancy said, not much comforted.

"We're not going to die." Frank said. "Hey, Joe's still out there. Branson said he wasn't going to kill him. He'll find us."

"How will he know where to look?"

"The same way we did."

Nancy felt the last knot loosen, and then Frank turned around, flexing his own fingers before he went to work on her ropes. She scooted forward to give him more room to work and bumped into the newly-laid brick wall. Resting her head against the cool brick, she felt another intense wave of relief that Frank was here. If she'd woken up in here alone, as the unfortunate victims in the adjoining cells must have, she would have been out of her mind with fear. Together, they could make it out of this, somehow.

And if they couldn't... well, spending her last few hours with Frank wasn't the worst way to die.

The thought made her heart twist, and panic began to overtake her again. All at once, it hit her that she might never see her father again, might never see Hannah, Bess, George, Joe... Ned...

Her ropes fell away and she brought her hands in front of her, rubbing her sore wrists. The next thing she did was sit up and push against the wall with all her strength. She drove her fingers into the cracks between the bricks, looking for any mortar that hadn't dried, but none of it budged. The cement was already rock-hard. Frustrated, she pounded against the bricks with her fists, ignoring the sting of the scratches she was inflicting on her hands.

"Hey." It wasn't until she felt Frank's hands cup her face that she realized that her breathing had become labored, and she was shaking. "Calm down, it's alright..."

"_Alright?_ How can you say that?" She was trying to stay calm, but her voice came out sounding watery.

"Come on, we've gotten out of worse situations than this." A tear dripped down her face and Frank brushed it away with his thumb.

Nancy took a deep breath. "Name one." she challenged.

He didn't respond.

"Frank?"

"I'm thinking."

Nancy's lips twitched upward despite herself. Always calm and always logical, that was Frank. "I wish I could see you." she said softly.

Frank let go of her face and she heard rustling in the darkness. There was a hissing sound. Suddenly their prison became faintly visible as he held up a lit match. Wordlessly, their eyes met. The serious expression on his handsome face told her that, for all his optimistic reassurances, the gravity of the situation was not at all lost on him.

They began to survey their surroundings. They had both gotten to their knees and were facing each other, in a rectangular room the size of a small closet, brick walls on all four sides. To her—admittedly untrained—eye, the bricks were laid evenly and uniformly, without any obvious weak points.

Frank lowered the match slowly, and she realized that it had burned down nearly enough to singe his fingers. He carefully laid it on the bare cement floor, letting it burn all the way to the end. The flickering light grew dimmer and dimmer. She hadn't realized how comforting the light was until it was almost gone. She kept her eyes on Frank's face until the match was nothing but a glowing ember, which finally cooled into total darkness once more.

Without a word, they moved together, wrapping their arms around each other in a tight embrace. "How many more matches do you have?" she said into the side of his neck.

"Not many." he answered quietly.

They shifted so they were sitting more comfortably against the wall, still holding each other. Silence stretched out between them.

* * *

The darkness and the silence made tracking the passage of time difficult, and Nancy didn't know how long it had been since they'd lit the match. Had it been forty minutes? Two hours? "Frank..." she said finally, "In case we don't get out of here-"

"Nan, don't." Frank cut her off. His arm was still around her shoulders, and he gave them a gentle squeeze. "It's too soon for goodbyes."

"I'd rather say it too early than too late." Nancy murmured. "I'm so sorry I got you and Joe involved in this. I had no idea what Gary and Marlene were, and I let myself get blindsided. It's my case, this is my fault."

"_Your _case?" Frank repeated. "I thought this was _our_ case." Before she could answer, he continued, "When you called me, I jumped at the chance to come up here, believe me. I wouldn't have been anywhere else. I love working with you, Nancy." he paused, and his voice took on a determined tone. "I love _being_ with you. And when we get out of here, I want you to promise me something."

"What's that?" she asked weakly.

"That we'll talk about this. About _us_." He leaned his forehead against hers. "No more brushing off our feelings, pretending nothing's happening here. No more excuses."

"Frank..." Even if she _had _thought they were going to get out of here, the prospect of having this conversation with him was daunting. For so long, they had put barriers between themselves, barriers that only came down when death seemed to be imminent.

"Nan?" he whispered back.

Just hearing him say her name like that sent that familiar rush of warmth coursing through her, and here, now, she had no incentive to fight it. "Promise." she said softly. "When we get out of here, we'll talk."

"All right." he said, pulling back. "Then let's get out of here."

An involuntary laugh escaped her. "How?"

"Dunno yet." he said, and there was a smile in his voice as well. "What do we have to work with? They took our cell phones and your flashlight, but I've still got my keys and my wallet. How about you?"

Nancy frowned, digging her hands into her jean pockets. "Um... my room key, a chapstick, and some quarters." she said finally, trying to sound braver than she felt. "What now, MacGyver?"

Frank had stood, probably to examine the walls. "I wish they had left the lights on in the cellar. It's too dark to see if there are any cracks between the bricks."

"Well, the floor is solid cement." Nancy remarked, tapping it with her fingers.

"Which leaves the ceiling." Frank finished. "It's wood. Softer than cement or brick. It might be our best bet."

"It's gotta be a couple inches thick." Nancy said. "And all we have to dig with are a few keys."

"...We've got matches." Frank pointed out after a long minute. "We could burn through."

Even to Nancy, that sounded extraordinarily dangerous. "Even if we could somehow get a fire started, how would we control it? We might end up burning the place down. We could asphyxiate on the smoke. It's not like we can run if it gets out of control."

"So we die a little faster than planned. And if this miserable place burns to the ground while we're at it, all the better." Sensing her hesitance, he softly said, "What other choice do we have, Nan? Sit here and wait for rescue? That's not who we are."

He was right. Nancy took a deep breath. "We can burn the ropes." she said finally. "If we could attach the ropes to the ceiling with the duct tape and let them burn, it might catch the ceiling, or at least weaken it."

"It's a start." Frank agreed. "And chapstick is petroleum-based. If we coat the ropes with it, it might act like candle wax and make them burn longer."

Together they prepared the ropes and duct tape as best they could in the darkness, but it fell to Nancy to climb onto Frank's shoulders to apply it to the ceiling.

"Ready?" Frank asked. He was leaning against the wall to better support her weight and keep them steady.

"Yeah." Nancy said. She struck one of their few precious matches and proceeded to light the rope at both ends. "Here goes nothing." Quickly, she scrambled down from Frank's shoulders and they both pressed themselves against the far wall, hopefully out of the way of any falling ashes. As the flame burned more and more of the rope, their tiny cell got brighter and brighter, the light nearly blinding after the time they'd spent in pitch darkness. Together, they watched as the flames danced along the ropes, licking at the ceiling, but not catching it. "I think it's singeing a little..." Nancy murmured nervously. She may have underestimated how difficult it would be to catch the wooden ceiling on fire.

A burning piece of rope fell to the floor, spraying a small shower of sparks. Frank dropped to his knees to pat out a large ember that had landed on the knee of Nancy's jeans. "Did it burn you?" he asked, looking up at her with concern in his eyes.

Nancy shook her head, fingering the tiny hole it had left. "No, just my pants." Taking his hand, she raised him back up to her level. "Thanks."

"Anytime." he said quietly.

She found herself slightly mesmerized by the way the firelight flickered over his face and berated herself, once again, for thinking such thoughts at such an inexcusable time. Maybe she could blame her errant thoughts on the smoke inhalation, for the air inside their tiny room had begun to take on a smoky taste and smell.

The cell was beginning to get dark again, though, as more and more of the rope turned to ash and fell to the floor, leaving behind dark, burned lines on the ceiling. Once again, the pair watched as the flame turned to ember which cooled into darkness. After such bright light, the dark somehow seemed even darker.

"Time to see how we did." Frank remarked, boosting Nancy onto his shoulders once more.

She reached up and located the burned area with her fingers. Using the sharp edge of her room key, she scraped away as much of the weakened wood as she could. Her arms tired quickly from holding them over her head, so they took a break every few minutes to allow her to rest her arms, while Frank rested his shoulders and back. It took a number of breaks before her fingers finally encountered something of a different texture. "Um, Frank? Under the wood, there's some other kind of material, like a foam."

"Some sort of insulation." Frank guessed. "Maybe a vapor barrier. The key to storing wine is keeping the temperature and humidity steady at an acceptable level."

Nancy bit her tongue before she could ask sarcastically if it was also the key to storing dead bodies... there was really something endearing about him sharing his knowledge of wine cellar maintenance while she was perched on his shoulders trying to claw their way out of a tomb.

"It should only be an inch or two thick. Can you cut through it?"

"Already done." Nancy said. The key had sliced through the foam insulation like a hot knife through butter. Unfortunately, above _that_ was the floorboards of the first level. She scraped her key over the bottom of the floorboards, but even without seeing it she could tell that it wasn't making much of a scratch. She widened the hole she'd made in the insulation, trying to find the edge of the floorboard. "This last layer's going to be—oh my god, Frank. I can see light." She barely believed it, but it was true. Light was coming through a crack between two of the boards. "It must be morning." She used her palm to push up on the end of one of the boards, but couldn't get the leverage to move it. Beneath her, Frank grunted in pain. "Sorry!" she apologized. "Let's take a break." He grasped her hands and helped her down, and they both slid to the floor.

"What now?" he asked. "Do we burn through again?"

"We have no more duct tape." Nancy pointed out tiredly. "Or chapstick. Or rope."

"Shh!" Frank shushed her suddenly. "Did you hear that?"

She had, but she'd thought she was hearing things. "The doorbell?" she whispered. "Who do you think it is?"

"They're not going to let anyone in." Frank said with dull certainty. "We've only been in here a few hours, they have to know we're not dead yet. Why would they risk inviting in someone who could hear us scream?"

"They probably think we're still tied up and gagged." Nancy pointed out, still whispering. "I mean, they get off on walling people up alive... maybe they'd get a kick out of having a tea party or something upstairs, knowing we're down here listening." A grotesque thought occurred to her and she gasped, covering her mouth with her hands. "Maybe they'll give a tour of the wine cellar... that's what they did when _we_ came." It hardly mattered now, but she hoped that the girl—the one she had discovered in the neighboring cell—had already been dead when they arrived at Rogues' Haven. She was instantly sickened by the idea that that poor girl had been lying there listening, too weak for her desperate scratchings to be heard, while she and the Hardys had joked and chatted with the Bransons _just_ on the other side of the wall...

Frank took her hand, and it seemed like he was about to say something to comfort her, but they were shocked into stillness when they heard footsteps creaking just above them. Then, the sound of the front door opening. "Someone answered it." he whispered, stunned. There was some indistinguishable speech from multiple voices.

"Should we yell?" she whispered back. On one hand, they didn't know whether the visitor was friend or foe. It could be a friend of Gary and Marlene's who was just as sick as them, which would just draw the Bransons' attention to the fact that they weren't dead yet. Or worse, their screaming could tip off an innocent person to their situation, forcing the Bransons to make him or her their newest victim just to cover it up.

On the other hand, this might be their only chance to escape.

They both held completely still, listening, as more footsteps passed over their heads. "Sounds like more than one person." Frank murmured. "There's safety in numbers, the Bransons wouldn't be able to kill them all, would they?"

Nancy dragged him to his feet. "Lift me up again. I might be able to hear what they're saying." She climbed onto Frank's shoulders, straining to push her eye against the thin slit between the boards. "There's a couple guys up there." she whispered. "I can't see who they are."

One of the men started talking, loudly. Frank started. "That's Joe!"

His sudden movement had caused Nancy to wobble, first banging her head on the wooden ceiling and then her open palm in an attempt to stop herself from falling. The noise above them quieted. Nancy pressed a hand to her smarting head. "I think they heard us."

"Joe!" Frank yelled. "The Bransons are the killers! We're trapped in the cellar!"

Taking that as her cue, Nancy began beating on the floorboards with her fists. "_Joe!_"

Above them, they heard the sounds of a scuffle: yelling, footsteps, scuffing shoes, something breaking, something falling. A gunshot.

Fear gripped Nancy's heart at the sound.

"Joe!" Frank howled again. "Joe!"

Nancy pounded even more frantically. Then she screamed in earnest as she peered up through the crack once more, only to see a big blue eye looking back at her.

"Nancy!" Joe yelped, jumping back a little. "Is Frank in there with you?"

"Yes!" Nancy cried. "Gary and Marlene tied us up and bricked us into the wall!"

Joe stood up straight and swore between gritted teeth before turning back to her. "Hey, the police are here. We've got Gary and Marlene. We're gonna get you out of there."

Nancy felt almost boneless with relief. Gary and Marlene were in police custody. Joe was going to get them out of here. She let herself slide off of Frank's shoulders and into his arms. It took a few minutes for Joe and the cops to clear Gary and Marlene out of the house and get the necessary tools for breaking through the floor. With a crowbar, in only took half a minute to pry up a handful of floorboards, sending sunlight flooding through the hole they had made.

"All right, you two, stand back and cover your heads." A man's voice warned from above. A minute later, a sledgehammer was punching through the insulation and wooden ceiling layers, widening the hole enough that Frank and Nancy could fit through.

"Hey, give me your hand."

Nancy turned to Frank. "One last boost?" she requested softly. With a warm, tired smile, he cupped his hands for her to step into and lifted, propelling her up into Joe's waiting arms.

She took a deep breath of fresh air, clinging to Joe like a lifeline. "I've never been more happy to see you." she told him. "Actually, I don't think I've ever been happier to see anyone."

"My pleasure, Drew." Joe said obligingly, hugging her back. Over his shoulder, she saw a beautiful but disheveled girl hovering nearby. She was wearing nothing but a tank top and terrycloth shorts, as if she'd been abducted from her bed in the middle of the night, and Joe's jacket was draped around her shoulders. "Chrissie!" she exclaimed.

"Yeah," Joe said. "I wanted to tell you when I found her two days ago, but... someone sort of snuck up behind me and knocked me out. Then he left us both tied up in the barn—there's a trap door out there that's pretty well hidden. With Chrissie's help I managed to get untied, and then we broke out of the barn, found my cell phone and called the cops. I guessed it was Gary, but I didn't know for sure until... well, about five minutes ago, when I heard Frank shouting it under my feet."

Two policemen were helping Frank out of the hole. As soon as his feet were back on firm ground, Nancy embraced him wordlessly.

"Is there anyone else trapped down there?" One of the cops asked.

Frank didn't release his hold on Nancy. "No one still alive."

Joe looked at him, stunned. "You mean...?" he trailed off, looking sick.

Frank nodded solemnly. "It's really good to see you, Joe. Really good."

* * *

"I called Faye to let her know Chrissie was safe." Nancy said, coming through the door of the adjoining hotel rooms they'd rented at the Holiday Inn in town. Besides being an unsanctioned mausoleum, Rogues' Haven was a crime scene now, and nobody would be staying there for a long time... if ever again. "They're still not back yet?"

"Not yet." Frank said, looking up from his seat on the couch. She and Frank had told their stories to the police first, and they had been sent home to shower and rest while Joe and Chrissie (who seemed disinclined to leave Joe's side, not that anyone could blame her) gave their statements.

Of course, their statements were likely going to be icing on the cake, given that, by the time they'd gotten down to the station, Gary Branson had already spilled his guts about Nancy and Frank's attempted murder, Joe's and Chrissie's kidnappings, and the five unfortunate victims immured in the cellar walls.

Poor Chrissie had been shocked to find out that she was supposed to have been victim number six, but that with the arrival of Mr. and Mrs. Winters, followed soon after by the arrival of Frank, Nancy, and Joe, the Bransons had not had the opportunity to wall her up as they'd intended. They hadn't wanted to risk moving her from the barn with so many people in the house, but when the detectives split up to investigate, Joe had discovered the hidden trap door and the girl behind it, so Gary was forced to take him too. The new plan had been to bury Joe and Chrissie in the cellar... at least, it had been until Frank and Nancy had stumbled upon the cellar's grisly secret.

Nancy had showered, but rest seemed to be beyond her, and judging from the fact that Frank was sitting in his room in the middle of the day with all of the lights on, she guessed sleep wasn't coming easily to him either.

"Faye must have been relieved to hear about Chrissie." Frank remarked as she sat down beside him. "It's always nice when you can give someone good news about the end of a case... If you can call five dead bodies instead of six 'good news'."

"I know what you mean..." Nancy mused. "But one person saved makes a big difference to them."

"I know." Frank said. "And I guess when the others are dug out and identified, at least it will give their families some closure."

"And with Gary's confession, I think the Bransons will be going away for a long time, even if Marlene keeps refusing to talk." Nancy added.

"All the loose ends tied up."

Nancy took a deep, fortifying breath and shook her head. "Not quite..."

Frank looked at her, a frown on his handsome face, which softened as he realized what she was referring to. "Now?"

She shrugged, smiling. "It's not like either of us is really going to be getting any sleep right now, not with that nightmare still fresh in our minds." she said. "And... I did promise to... to tell you how much you mean to me."

Frank found her hand and laced their fingers together, and any uncertainty she'd had about broaching this conversation flew out the window into the sunlight.

* * *

When Joe entered the suite an hour later, he couldn't decide whether he was shocked or patently unsurprised to find Nancy and his brother curled up together on the bed, fully clothed and fast asleep, with all the lights on.

* * *

A/N: I know, I know, but I never_ intended_ to write the talk. You know what they said though: all that stuff they should have said when they chickened out at the end of Last Resort.

Seriously, though, I hope you enjoyed it! Drop me a line and let me know what you thought!


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